Kasich 'confident' in process to expand Medicaid

SCIO, Ohio - The controversy surrounding the Medicaid expansion that Gov. John Kasich obtained by going through the state Controlling Board is over, as far as the governor is concerned.

Joe Vardon, The Columbus Dispatch

SCIO, Ohio - The controversy surrounding the Medicaid expansion that Gov. John Kasich obtained by going through the state Controlling Board is over, as far as the governor is concerned.

"That's behind us now. We have to implement it, and I really feel very confident about this litigation," Kasich told The Dispatch yesterday - among the few comments he's made about his controversial move to expand Medicaid without the consent of the Republican-controlled legislature.

On Oct. 21, the Kasich administration won approval from the Controlling Board, a seven-member spending-oversight panel, to spend $2.56 billion in federal dollars provided under President Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act to expand Ohio's Medicaid program to cover an additional 275,000 poor people.

One day later, conservative attorney Maurice Thompson, six Republican members of the Ohio House and two local chapters of Right to Life sued in the state Supreme Court to reverse the Controlling Board's decision. The state's response is due Wednesday.

Kasich told The Dispatch that he's warned his staff not to use the new money to "build bureaucracies."

"We can't start building bigger facilities or have everyone start raising their salaries," said Kasich, who said his Medicaid advisers are developing metrics to monitor the success of Ohio's expansion. "We need to make sure the money goes to people who need it."

Kasich will be in New York City tonight as the headliner for the New York state Republican Party's fundraiser, where he said he will "talk about Ohio" but wasn't sure if he will discuss the expansion.

Kasich has suggested publicly that Medicaid expansion is not tied to Obamacare - which Republicans despise - even though that's what funds the added coverage.

Yesterday, he seemed to acknowledge the link.

"It's going to hurt people who want to grow their businesses beyond 50 (people); it could cause lesser hours for part-time workers," Kasich said of the overall law, "but the Medicaid element was one side of it that I thought made sense."